Life through the eyes of a hopeless dreamer

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A Sad Ending

I made it to Yerington, NV yesterday. Due to rain, yes, rain, I spent two days in Minden. That was one day more than I intended. Furthermore, I was going to stop in Wilson Canyon for a few days, but I missed my turn. Oh, well. It was a beautiful drive through a beautiful area. I’ll have to mark that spot on my map for a return visit.

I am currently at an abandoned drive-in theater on the north end of town. If I’ve done my research right, this place became part of BLM land. If I haven’t done adequate research I’m sure to have a friendly visit from a government agent before long.

This drive-in has definitely seen better days. Check out a couple of the photos I’ve taken so far. I won’t overload you with something that is quite evident by looking at one or two shots of a sad situation. Drive-ins like this one bring back memories of a youth that was lost on the young.

Last evening, while I was cooking dinner on my Weber, I got to thinking about the time when drive-in theaters began their serious decline. When I was a teenager it was the place to take a date. Oh, what good times were had in the front seats, and backseats, of those 50’s and 60’s models of cars we drove. Some of us even had pickups. But, it was the autos from a bygone era that saw the most action at those drive-in theaters that dotted the landscape surrounding the small towns of America.

My thinking turned to my current situation. I doubt very seriously I’d take a lady to a drive-in picture show in Old Gray. There’s not much room in a Jeep Wrangler, and the comfort level is, well, very low.

However, Roo would fit the bill quite nicely. I’m currently parked so that I can see the dilapidated screen from the comfort of my bed. I wonder what my high school girlfriend’s father would have said if I had shown up in a 33 foot Bounder to pick up his daughter for our date on Saturday night? Yeah, that probably would not have gone over too well.

This morning I wandered around the property looking at the run down condition the buildings and screen are in. The heyday for this place was well before my time. They didn’t even pave the roadways with asphalt. They were just gravel. But, I’m sure that the gravel road was not a bother. The young couples of the day would have probably been happy to walk, just so long as they could spend an evening getting to know one another while enjoying a movie. (Side question: How many times did you go to a drive-in, and then fear the moment the next day when your mother or father would ask you about the movie? Did you even see the movie?)

A friend had commented that there is not much to see in the desert. I guess this is technically a desert. They get about eight inches of rain a year around here. Fortunately there is a river that runs through the area, allowing it to be a fine little agricultural spot in the midst of the sagebrush and sand.

There is all sorts of life in these wide open spaces. The lizards around here are quite quick, and continually on guard. They blend in so well that I don’t see them until they move. The birds are noisy, but since there are no trees they can hide quite well in the sagebrush that is so abundant here. Listening to their chatter is a great way to wake up in the morning. There’s a critter that looks something like a chipmunk, but I don’t think it is. I saw a couple of them around sunrise, but it seems they have disappeared now. Maybe they’re doing what I should be doing—taking a nap. The rabbits aren’t as big as they are around Sand Mountain, but they still have some size to them, and they move rather quickly. I’m sure more varmints have seen me, than I have seen of them. I’ll have to keep a better look out.

The recent rains have greened things up a bit, and a few flowers are blooming. I don’t expect too much in that area, though, because the moisture that fell from the sky was not abundant.

There is one drawback to where I am. Town is too close, and the road is even closer still. I hear road noise, but it’s not too distracting. For a few days this place will do quite nicely while I contemplate my next move thought the heart of Nevada. Eventually I’m sure to meet up with an alien or two, but in the meantime I may as well enjoy the wide open spaces that so many crave, but so few experience.